A tri-level model for the strategic game between the mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) platform and on-demand operators

Abstract

This paper studies a multi-modal mobility system with a mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) platform, transportation network companies (TNCs), and mass transit (MT). The MaaS platform competes with TNCs and MT for travelers meanwhile cooperating with them to serve multi-modal trips. A tri-level model is formulated to capture the complex interactions among the stakeholders, where the MaaS platform designs service at the upper level, TNCs optimize their strategies at the middle level, and travelers make service choices following a nested logit (NL) model at the lower level. Numerical results show that a profit-maximizing MaaS platform can hardly survive in a market with excessive service capacity, whereas it becomes more appealing to long-distance travelers when travel time is prioritized over cost. On the other hand, when demand is high but insensitive to travel time, the MaaS platform may dominate the market by consolidating all service capacities of TNCs.